I did this recipe back in early march and its in the keg about 2 weeks now.
http://ghostfishbrewing.com/ghostfishblog/gfhomebrewing-grapefruit-ipa/
All in all I am pretty happy with the result. Its tastes like a solid IPA and I'm thinking that its going to be a good basis for adaptation and experimentation into some variations. I just wanted to share with others that might try this and also use this for my own reference for later. If you see anything you can point out or would like to comment, I welcome any feedback that can help me.
I had some trip-ups during this brewing process. I've done about 15 or so barley based batches but this was my first experience with GF recipes. Some observations on brew day, and during racking, kegging, etc:
- I hadn't worked with weight based (non-barley) ingredients before so measuring out the buckwheat honey and sorghum was kind of comical. I got some good feedback on that in a separate thread I started a few weeks ago. Next time will be smoother and less messy for sure. Someone mentioned weighing goop (honey/sorghum syrup/etc) in a Pyrex measuring cup (using the tare on the scale of course) then rather than trying to scrape out the contents, simple dropping it into the boil and fishing it out later. unless someone tells me there's an issue, I may try that to get an accurate amount of "goop" into my wort.
- I altered the recipe as follows: I used 1# maltodextrine and the zest of an entire grapefruit. I think the former was OK, there's a nice mouth feel, but even though I love the grapefruit POP this beer has, I can recognize that I may have gone overboard and next time will do the 1/2 grapefruit as Igliashon specified. after 2 weeks in the keg, the grapefruit zest and hops eliminate about 75% of the sorghum twang I detected in the 70 degree wort and its even improved a bit since last week when I first kegged it.
- my gravity came out higher than the recipe (1.065 vs 1.057). i think that's due to my comical weighing of honey and sorghum, and candi syrup.
- i proofed my dry yeast as the recipe states and it looked active. however, after about 36 hours I saw very little activity in the bucket, so I sanitized a spoon and "gently stirred" (it was barely a stir) the wort from the bottom (i.e. no whirlpool on top to minimize oxygen introduction). within 6-12 hours i had a decent krausen going so I was relieved. I don't know if the gentle stir helped or it was going to ramp up anyway. i did a nice dump and aggressive stir of cooled from kettle to primary but i may try much more stirring next time.
- racking to secondary went pretty smooth but I had to use a sanitized hop sock over the racking cane to stand a chance of getting out wort through all the trub. The recipe mentioned this and it helped stave off problems I would have no doubt would've had.
- I have skipped secondary in the past on lots of batches but this batch really did need the benefit of a secondary to clear the sediment out a bit. I was also not hitting my final gravity and I got a few more points (4-5 points I memory serves) by the movement from primary to secondary.
- I missed my final gravity by quite a bit: 1.022 +-1 point (recipe called for 17 or lower). I fermented in primary for 10-11 days then probably another 3-4 days in a carboy, then I cold crashed it for about 1 day. Since my OG was about 65 (not 57) I just rolled with the higher FG (the drop from 65 to 22 is similar to the recipe's drop of 57 to 17). I'm not sure if there's anything I could have done better to get below 1.022-I was there for 3-4 days.
Experience tells me to let this beer sit in the keg 1-2 months and a lot of the small defects will age out so that's what I'm trying to do: I'm only taking small samples over the next few weeks and noting any differences as it ages. I'm hoping the grapefruit mellows a little and the sorghum twang disappears. We shall see!
http://ghostfishbrewing.com/ghostfishblog/gfhomebrewing-grapefruit-ipa/
All in all I am pretty happy with the result. Its tastes like a solid IPA and I'm thinking that its going to be a good basis for adaptation and experimentation into some variations. I just wanted to share with others that might try this and also use this for my own reference for later. If you see anything you can point out or would like to comment, I welcome any feedback that can help me.
I had some trip-ups during this brewing process. I've done about 15 or so barley based batches but this was my first experience with GF recipes. Some observations on brew day, and during racking, kegging, etc:
- I hadn't worked with weight based (non-barley) ingredients before so measuring out the buckwheat honey and sorghum was kind of comical. I got some good feedback on that in a separate thread I started a few weeks ago. Next time will be smoother and less messy for sure. Someone mentioned weighing goop (honey/sorghum syrup/etc) in a Pyrex measuring cup (using the tare on the scale of course) then rather than trying to scrape out the contents, simple dropping it into the boil and fishing it out later. unless someone tells me there's an issue, I may try that to get an accurate amount of "goop" into my wort.
- I altered the recipe as follows: I used 1# maltodextrine and the zest of an entire grapefruit. I think the former was OK, there's a nice mouth feel, but even though I love the grapefruit POP this beer has, I can recognize that I may have gone overboard and next time will do the 1/2 grapefruit as Igliashon specified. after 2 weeks in the keg, the grapefruit zest and hops eliminate about 75% of the sorghum twang I detected in the 70 degree wort and its even improved a bit since last week when I first kegged it.
- my gravity came out higher than the recipe (1.065 vs 1.057). i think that's due to my comical weighing of honey and sorghum, and candi syrup.
- i proofed my dry yeast as the recipe states and it looked active. however, after about 36 hours I saw very little activity in the bucket, so I sanitized a spoon and "gently stirred" (it was barely a stir) the wort from the bottom (i.e. no whirlpool on top to minimize oxygen introduction). within 6-12 hours i had a decent krausen going so I was relieved. I don't know if the gentle stir helped or it was going to ramp up anyway. i did a nice dump and aggressive stir of cooled from kettle to primary but i may try much more stirring next time.
- racking to secondary went pretty smooth but I had to use a sanitized hop sock over the racking cane to stand a chance of getting out wort through all the trub. The recipe mentioned this and it helped stave off problems I would have no doubt would've had.
- I have skipped secondary in the past on lots of batches but this batch really did need the benefit of a secondary to clear the sediment out a bit. I was also not hitting my final gravity and I got a few more points (4-5 points I memory serves) by the movement from primary to secondary.
- I missed my final gravity by quite a bit: 1.022 +-1 point (recipe called for 17 or lower). I fermented in primary for 10-11 days then probably another 3-4 days in a carboy, then I cold crashed it for about 1 day. Since my OG was about 65 (not 57) I just rolled with the higher FG (the drop from 65 to 22 is similar to the recipe's drop of 57 to 17). I'm not sure if there's anything I could have done better to get below 1.022-I was there for 3-4 days.
Experience tells me to let this beer sit in the keg 1-2 months and a lot of the small defects will age out so that's what I'm trying to do: I'm only taking small samples over the next few weeks and noting any differences as it ages. I'm hoping the grapefruit mellows a little and the sorghum twang disappears. We shall see!
